“Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one…”

According to Jesus the world, as we know it is not the world God intends.  The prayer tenet “your will be done on earth as it is in heaven” rests upon this premise.  Not everything that happens is God’s will.  Some things are not as they should be, and we should want those things to be otherwise, just as God wants them to be otherwise.  Prayer asks God to stop evil and repair the damage it perpetrates. 

God does not cause brokenness.  Nor does it erupt by accident.  Jesus contends that evil is forced into the world by a deliberate Will,  the “Evil One,” he calls the devil.  Christians believe that evil has a personality and a willful intent. 

Jesus closes his prayer model by directing his followers to ask God for two specific forms to protection.  First we are to ask that God will direct their life paths away from pitfalls and distractions: the effects of evil in the world.  King Solomon once said, “In all your ways acknowledge him [God] and he will make your paths straight” (Proverbs 3:6).  Jesus also tells us to pray for rescue against the willful force of the Cause of evil. 

We are to ask God to intervene with our interests and his in mind in words like, “Father, you have a ‘top of the mountain’ perspective.  Please steer the course of my life away from anything that could detract me from my destiny.  And when you see the Evil One moving to thwart your plans for me, intervene and stop him!”